I played a little bit of this, and while it’s definitely still a work in progress, it actually feels like a cohesive game coming together.
I played a little bit of this, and while it’s definitely still a work in progress, it actually feels like a cohesive game coming together.
I haven’t thought about this game in many years. I only remember it taking so long to come out it became an early meme, and then finally coming out as a wet fart after all those years.
I guess the mod is based on earlier leaked builds? I only took a glance at the ModDB page. Have you played the original? Is the mod any better?
To be honest, it wasn’t bad, for a Duke Nukem game. The issue is that the Duke Nukem style just wasn’t good compared to modern games anymore. It was a late 90s game released in 2011. It also didn’t go all in on the campiness either so it couldn’t even cross into that territory and wrap back around to being good.
The exact problem with the released DNF is that it wasn’t a “late 90s game”. The late 90s-early 2000s style of games are right now very popular. There is, and has been a market for them.
The problems with the released DNF is that the producers didn’t have faith in any particular direction and kept having the devs start over again and again to chase trends. In the end, Gearbox got the rights to DNF and cobbled together a game nobody cared about. The released DNF was the most mediocre, trend chasing mid-00s game imaginable with all of the HALO and Call Of Duty game design influence that could be crammed in, while bringing nothing additional of value to the table.
The DNF 2001 Restoration project is already more enjoyable than the released game, proving that early 2000s style of game design is perfectly viable.
It’s a stand alone project building off of the 2001 build’s leak, trying to turn it into a completed game.
The download includes the leaked original content as well if you want to compare. The original content isn’t really playable as anything but novelty, since it’s more like the skeleton of a game than a game. The project has made strides in all aspects to turn half finished, often unpopulated locations into actual game levels. Pigcops are back, Duke’s model is improved, more voice acting included, level design with scripted encounters. Lots of stuff.